


Four Gifts Hell Gave Dean

by sistabro



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Community: sharp_teeth, Gen, Gore, Hell, Hellhounds, Horror, Season/Series 04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-22
Updated: 2011-04-22
Packaged: 2017-10-18 11:58:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/188668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sistabro/pseuds/sistabro
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Belatedly written for gabby_silang's fabulous <a href="http://community.livejournal.com/sharp_teeth/2807.html?thread=457719#t457719"> prompt</a> for sharp_teeth round 2: Supernatural: Hell misses Dean. It sends him love letters. They aren't immediately recognizable as love letters.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Four Gifts Hell Gave Dean

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nicasio_silang](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nicasio_silang/gifts).



**Flower**

Outside of Chicago, they find a dead dove on the hood of the Impala. Laid on its back, soft white wings splayed out like it's ready for dissection. Beak bloody, eyes milky blue, clutched in its talons is a dark red rose.

Sam says it's the bird flu. Dean just wants it off his car. They bag it up without touching it and throw it away, rose and all.

 

 **Car Wash**

When they step out of the diner after lunch, the whole parking lot is humming with a low buzzing drone that they can feel in their sinuses and teeth. Six spaces from the door, the Impala writhes and shimmers in sickly, iridescent green waves.

Flies, Dean realizes after a moment. The car is covered in flies so thick he can't see any part of it, not a single spec of chrome or glass or paint. Even the tires are hidden beneath the moving cloak of flickering wings and little black bodies.

They stand and stare under the hot prairie sun for a good five minutes until, all at once, the flies rise into the air like demon smoke. Their eyes follow the black cloud as it buzzes away. When it is finally silent, Dean turns to the Impala.

He has never seen the car so clean. It shines brightly in the sun, polished by millions of miniscule fly feet. Hurts his eyes to look at it.

Dean walks closer, peers inside, half afraid another swarm is going to fly out and eat his face off. But the car is empty except for a neat pile of trash on the backseat of the otherwise spotless interior.

He looks at Sam, who shrugs.

Dean opens the backdoor to throw the garbage away so they can get on the road. He feels a little bad about the smears of grease his fingers leave on the pristine door handle.

 

 **Puppy**

Outside of Albuquerque, a hellhound takes up residence in the back seat.

It isn't a very big one, more of a pup really, but it won't leave. It's not hurting anything as far as they can tell; there are no reports of maulings or deaths or even missing pets in the towns they pass through. So after a while, they stop trying—and failing—to ditch the hound and mostly ignore it. After a couple of weeks, they hardly notice the faint smell of sulfur and bloody dog at all.

Then someone tries to steal the Impala.

The screaming is what gets them out of bed, barefoot, bare-chested, hands clutching knives and guns. It isn't until they open the door and stumble outside that they hear the growls.

Heel! Dean shouts. Hopes it works because invisible dogs are hard to shoot and a dead body in the parking lot will attract too much attention. Already people are opening their doors and peering out.

There's a wet, meaty, tearing sound. The screaming crescendos, an aria of pain that eventually descends into whimpering as the thief stumbles away, a trail of blood stringing out behind him.

A moment later, sulfurous breaths blow hot against his thigh. Something crunches, scrapes and grinds. Dean looks down, watches the bloody remnants of two fingers pop in and out of sight as the hellhound's teeth crush and break the bones, tear apart the tendons.

Good dog, Dean says. He gropes around until he finds the top of the hound's head and scratches in time to the gentle bob of its skull as it finishes its well earned snack.

 

 **Serenade**

Sam is gone, off on some secret errand again, when Dean wakes in pit of night. The seductive screams of hell still echo in his head. Cotton sheets twist and bind him, warm and soft and strong like skin ropes. He can't quite shake the feeling that the room is breathing around him, like the cages used to do just before they shot out their chains and spikes and hooks to pin him in place for Alastair.

Goosebumps pebble his arms and chest when he stumbles outside. He sits on the ground until a warm, heavy, invisible head comes to rest on his thigh.

It's a ritual now. For hours he'll sit on some cold stoop, petting a hellhound no different than those that ripped his soul from his body all those years ago. He'll feel out the ears and scratch behind them, stroke the soft fur back from the skull. Wait for the owls.

It never fails, since Dean came back. If he sits alone outside at night for more than fifteen minutes, they'll come, swooping down in whispers of air. And when there are enough, the owls will start to coo and hoot and screech and scream. Turn those golden, glowing eyes on him and sing.

The eerie racket lasts until the hound lifts its head and gives a warning growl, startling the owls into silent flight. Sam and his demon girlfriend. The hound can smell her, smell Dean's hatred of her.

Heel, Dean says, like he does every night. Knows that soon he won't bother, will say sic and maim and kill instead, but he's too tired to break their fragile peace tonight.

Dean goes inside and back to bed. Crawls under the cold sheets and curls his hand beneath his cheek. The door opens and he shuts his eyes, keeps his breathing deep and slow.

The smell of sulfur and dog on his hand is soothing, lulling. Dean lets himself descend into dreams, the screeching song of the owls still echoing in his ears mutating into the bittersweet screams of home.


End file.
